PINNER RICHARD

In this article I outline how and why I have established a self-assessment system for class participation scores in an English-speaking skills course at a Japanese university. I explain how my experience with one particular student, who personally admitted to having abused the system, led me to realize that elements from Yin and Yang have been playing an important part in my beliefs as a teacher, helping me to improve my self-assessment system and further reflect on my practice. Narrative inquiry is employed as both the primary means of collecting and analysing data, although as this is Exploratory Practice inquiry I triangulate my narrative using other sources arising from pedagogically generated materials and my own teaching journal. Through this inquiry I came to realize that sometimes bad experiences and overcoming difficulties can actually become good learning experiences if the right attitude is employed. In trying to deal with one particularly problematic student I was able to identify problems with the design of my assessment system, and thus make changes which improved the course for all participants. I believe I was more reflexive and alert to these improvements because of the Exploratory Practice inquiry that I was conducting. I was also able to identify how I placed special emphasis on issues of trust and taking responsibility, which I now recognize as having been central justifications for designing the self-assessment system in the first place.

The choice of what materials to use in the language classroom is perhaps one of the most fundamentally important and difficult decisions teachers and those responsible for choosing textbooks are faced with. Authenticity is often seen as a desirable component in the content we select and adapt for our language learners, and it has been shown that authentic materials are more motivating

This paper examines the various and problematic definitions of the term ‘authenticity’ with regards to CLIL and mainstream language pedagogy. Using questionnaires, teaching journals and in-class group interviews with students from a variety of different CLIL courses, this paper outlines a small-scale study conducted in Japan to examine CLIL students’ own perceptions of authenticity within language teaching and the relationship between content and authenticity. It also examines the students’ learning aims in an attempt to establish whether there was any preference in terms of content knowledge or language acquisition. Results indicated that, just as CLIL is defined as having ‘dual focused aims’ (Marsh, 2002), the students likewise held both content and language to be equally important. Content was also found to be the most important aspect in defining authenticity. Students expressed dissatisfaction with previous grammar-translation based instruction and advocated a more authentic and content-driven approach to language learning.

This is a feature in which individuals are invited to express their personal, and sometimes controversial, views on professional issues. These views are not necessarily those of the Editor, the Editorial Panel, or the Publisher. Reaction to Comment features is especially welcome in the form of a letter to the Editor. © The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press; all rights reserved.